Dreams In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men

Dreams. They can be large or small, but the outcome is always different compared to the expectations. In John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, dreams are a big factor in the plot since George and Lennie, the main characters, have the main dream of the whole story. The duo's dream is to have their own ranch someday as they work on a ranch in California. Other characters that have specific dreams in the story are Curley's Wife and Candy. Although they have big dreams in the story, the dreams tend to change all of their behaviors by getting ahead of themselves. Lennie is a character in which he is told to behave good in order to live his dream. The dream he has is to tend rabbits on a ranch that he has with George.This following quote shows that Lennie wants to keep his good behavior and follow George's orders when Curley's wife tried to talk to him. "'George says I ain't to have nothing to do with you—talk to you or nothing'" (86). Telling her to not talk to him makes him believe that he still has a chance to tend rabbits on his own ranch since he is showing a good behavior even though he does some wrong actions.

His dream of being on the ranch with George and Lennie leads him to feel more confident and not useless as he does on the current ranch. "'S'pose you get us canned. S'pose you do. You think we'll hit the highway an' look for another lousy two-bit job like this. You don't know that we got our own ranch to go to, an' our own house'" (79). This quote being said by Candy shows his confident coming through when Curley's Wife insulted him, Crooks, and Lennie by calling them bindle stiffs. Candy protecting himself, Lennie, and Crooks also shows the change of behavior when he found out that he is close to living the dream of being of his own